Santana gets the crowd higher at Bethel Woods

“The first time,” he told the crowd of about 7,500, “the goal was elevation. The second time it was to elevate ourselves. The third time is to keep elevating ourselves ...”

Steve Israel

BETHEL – Could Carlos Santana do it again?

Could he somehow match the lightning-strike intensity of his first two shows at the site of the 1969 Woodstock festival?

His first, 45 years ago this summer, launched his career. When he returned four years ago, he blew away the crowd of some 15,000 at Bethel Woods Center for the Arts with a show that was so incendiary, it seemed like musical sparks were flying into the Sullivan County night. It was one of the best shows I’ve seen at Bethel Woods.

Carlos Santana, now 66, did it again Sunday night. He again faced his past head on as he blasted off his nearly 2 and a half hour show by harmonizing with his younger self on film clips of that classic Woodstock performance of “Soul Sacrifice” – even segueing into a guitar quote or two of one of his heroes, Jimi Hendrix.

“The first time,” he told the crowd of about 7,500, “the goal was elevation. The second time it was to elevate ourselves. The third time is to keep elevating ourselves ...”

And elevate us he did. He was like a musical Merlin who often lifted the crowd of many Woodstock-era veterans to its collective feet and cast it under the swaying, hip-shaking spell of his 11 piece band’s relentless waves of Latin and African polyrhythms.

On a set that included extended, often improvised versions of old hits like “Oye Como Va” and “Black Magic Woman,” his music was so magnetic, the rhythms so kinetic, that when his vocalists shouted “Jump,” the crowd literally began jumping to the beat.

But after 45 years, Santana’s music isn't just a one-dimensional dance party that prompted one fan to shout “caliente.” Sure, his guitar stings and rings like no other. Yet while he can pierce your gut with jabbing flurries, he can also make your heart sing with sky-soaring single notes that he shapes into song. And during a set that quoted everything from the old blues tune ”Spoonful” to “Theme from A Summer Place,” Santana also used the silent spaces between those notes and the pauses between rhythms to give the music even more dynamics and drama.

He also knows how to warm your heart. After some two hours, he brought six young kids out of the audience and up on stage to hand them maracas and tambourines. As they shook to the beat, Carlos Santana was elevating members of yet another generation into his Woodstock spirit.